Social Recruitment: Myths and Legends

Social recruitment is the lovechild of social media and recruitment.

Depending on your perspective, it may be a beautiful, promising thing – or something you’d rather not touch with a ten foot pole.

Social recruitment isn’t as simple as crawling through dozens of profiles, searching for the perfect candidate. Done well, it involves the acquisition and analysis of data of multiple candidates, trends and your own social performance over long periods of time.

Social recruitment is half outbound, half inbound. You can use networks to actively search for new candidates, or you can let them come to you by portraying your organisation in the best light possible.

Here, we debunk a few enduring myths of social recruitment.

Myth: You should only recruit on professional social networks.

One of the most pervading myths of social recruitment is that all of your efforts should be focussed on professional networks, mainly LinkedIn.

Fact:

There is a whole world of viable candidates out there, and not all of them are easily found on LinkedIn. Maintaining an active social presence on multiple social networks and seeking new candidates across all of them can uncover some hidden gems.

Myth: To attract the best candidates, your own social presence must be spick and span.

Many business leaders and social media managers labour under the belief that an organisation’s social media presence must be 100% professional, no exceptions.

Fact:

Not every top quality candidate wants to work for the world’s driest organisation. It’s ok to breathe some life into your business’ social media presence and show some colour occasionally.

There’s nothing wrong with putting a human face on your organisation and showing that you’re people too. The best candidates already know this. If you look like you’re trying too hard, they’ll see right through it – especially if you’re a smaller organisation with no need for the facade.

Show what you’ve got to offer those who work for your organisation. A little bit of creativity in how you display the organisation and what it’s like to go there will go a long way.

Myth: You need to be present on every social channel.

The wider the presence, the bigger the impact – right?

Fact:

Ok, so the first point was to branch out a little and not just focus on LinkedIn. However, that doesn’t mean that you now must maintain an active presence across every single minor social media network on the internet.

Go where your audience is, and do it well. Be active, engage and add value where it counts.

Myth: Only millennials use social media.

There is a risk that your social recruitment efforts will only attract young candidates.

Fact:

Over half of Facebook’s members are older than 35. There are more than enough people of every age using social media to justify you utilising it for recruitment purposes, regardless of your target demographic.

Myth: If a candidate’s social accounts are unprofessional, you should disregard that candidate.

There’s a belief among some recruiters and HR managers that if someone can’t keep their late night hi-jinks off social media, they are unworthy for their perfect, holy organisation.

Fact:

Candidates are people. You want well adjusted humans working for your organisation. Employees who have lives and hobbies outside of work. A way to let off steam and a support network of good friends and close family.

Don’t pass over a candidate simply because they enjoy their weekends a little too much. Sure, if their Facebook is filled with them decrying the influence of lizard people in the financial sector, give them a pass.

Remember that social media is social. Unless it’s LinkedIn, this isn’t someone’s digital resume. If their profiles are squeaky clean, either they’re boring and won’t adjust well to a lively, engaging culture – or they’re hiding something.

To ensure you’re hiring the best talent from the right sources, and doing so at the right fees, let the TalentVine platform help you today!